


Fight or Flight

by GraeWrites



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series), Thomas Sanders, Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Arguing, Blood, Gen, Major Injury, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Panicking, Violence, brief mention of death, description of tight spaces
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-01
Updated: 2018-07-01
Packaged: 2019-05-31 13:06:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15120035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GraeWrites/pseuds/GraeWrites
Summary: ""ROMAN!” The strangled cry rips violently up his throat."Or, Virgil accompanies Roman on a quest, and a nightmare lurks just around the corner.





	Fight or Flight

**Author's Note:**

> I'm still very slowly working on getting at least most of these fics on tumblr also posted here. Credit to @thepoolofthedead on tumblr for giving me this idea of Virgil getting super strong in moments of extreme crisis and inspiring this fic. Sequel will be posted as well. Please let me know what you think!

“Remind me again why I let you drag me along for this?”

“Relax, Forrest Grump,” Roman quips, his voice chipper as ever, “We’re almost there.”

Virgil casts a wide, anxious glance at the narrow stairwell around them. Roman—sword sheathed at his hip, a torch extended outwards in his hands as the only source of light—leads the way in front of him. The spiraling stairs are dark and never seem to end. The tall brick walls on either side don’t help the general feeling of claustrophobia. Virgil has his hood pulled up, his gaze flickering between the damp and slippery steps and the Prince’s back in front of him.

Virgil scowls, trying to ignore the way his shoulders coil tighter at the distant sound of water dripping into a puddle that somehow seems to echo in the too-narrow pathway. “Roman, I don’t like this.”

“Yes, you’ve mentioned that. You know, you didn’t  _have_  to come, Edward Sullen. I was under the impression that you had  _wanted_  to join me.”

It wasn’t exactly that simple. Roman had been preparing for this quest over the past week, and over the course of those seven days, the knot in Virgil’s stomach had steadily worsened. He had never been a big fan of Roman going on quests in general—the closer together everyone is, the easier for Virgil to make sure they’re all safe—but he’d seen the excited twinkle steadily grow in the Prince’s eyes as the date for his departure neared, and Virgil had bitten his tongue against the words of concern he so badly wanted to voice.

But then Roman expressed some hesitation himself the night before he was due to depart. He asked if any of the other Sides might want to accompany him; an offer he’d made time and again whenever he left, but Virgil saw the tightness in his jaw and the way the cocky smile didn’t quite reach his eyes, and knew that Roman wasn’t just offering to be nice. He really wanted someone to come with him.

So Virgil—with a shrug of faux-indifference that contrasted with the ball of nerves sitting heavy in his chest—agreed. That had been five days ago.

Virgil clenches his jaw for a moment at Roman’s flippant disregard. “I did,” he replies. “But I just really—“

Roman stops suddenly and holds up a hand, causing Virgil to cut himself off. “Did you hear that?” the Creative Side asks in a whisper.

Virgil chews his lip but listens intently. Another few drops of water plop into a puddle. Roman’s soft breathing. Virgil is starting to think he can hear his own heartbeat.

Then he  _does_  hear what Roman is talking about. A quiet, distant growl. It’s low, guttural, but Virgil hears it. Something in his stomach squirms uncomfortably. Roman smiles faintly, but there’s a flicker of uncertainty in his eyes.

“Roman,” Virgil says, “Listen to me. I don’t know about this.”

The Prince shakes his head adamantly. “Virgil, you are more than welcome to turn back now. I will not force you to continue on this journey with me. But I must press on.”

“Why? _”_  Virgil demands suddenly, the word coming out harsher than he meant it to. He can’t place what is wrong, exactly, except that there was something sitting heavy in his chest that had only hardened and grown over the past five days with each step into this quest Virgil traveled. Being surrounded by so much raw, creative energy only led Virgil to think more and more about every possible thing that could go wrong, making it hard to think and increasingly harder to just  _breathe_.

Roman looks taken aback for a moment before frustration covers the surprise at the outburst. “Because this is what I  _do_ , Virgil.”

“But  _why_ —,” His voice is drowned out by another growl. Louder, and closer. Virgil thinks—although he isn’t sure—that he hears a faint hissing as well.

Roman’s head snaps away from Virgil as his hand falls to his sword at his hip. “I’m going to find out what’s at the bottom of this stairwell,” he says steadily. It takes Virgil a second to realize that he’s talking to him. “I won’t blame you if you want to turn back.”

“No. I-I’m coming with you.” Virgil hates the way his voice wavers, faint traces of distortion beginning to leak through. Roman sets the torch in a nearby empty holder and unsheathes his sword. The metallic scrape grates against Virgil’s ears and forces the rest of the air from his lungs.

The two of them descend the stairs together. With each step, Virgil has to try a little harder to breathe.

When they reach the bottom a few moments later, the heavy wooden door is all that stands between them and whatever the source of the growls and hisses are. They are louder now. Virgil thinks—if he could just  _focus_ —he could maybe make out what they’re saying…

Roman casts one last look back at Virgil, but it’s too fast for the Anxious Side to read his expression before he grabs the handle of the door and uses his shoulder to shove. It ricochets open, the Prince stumbling ungracefully into the room. Virgil wastes no time in rushing in after him.

The ‘room’ is really more of a cavern. It is mostly cast in dark shadows, but light trickles in faintly from somewhere up above, breaking in through cracks in the jagged gray rocks. It sparkles on the surface of the stream of water that runs through the middle of cave. The ground—darkened with moisture—is made of the same rocky unevenness that covers the walls.

The door slams shut loudly behind them. Virgil whirls around, lunging for the door handle and yanking on it. It does not budge.

“Roman, I swear if you’re—“

“Virgil. Get behind me.”

“What?”

When Virgil turns back around, he sees that Roman has positioned himself in front of him, his sword extended outward. His other arm is stretched out to his side as if to bar Virgil from something. His gaze follows past Roman’s shoulder. Silhouetted against the faint light is a dark figure. The Anxious Side squints a little, his eyes still adjusting to the darkness. The figure looks almost human.

Almost.

“Uh,” Virgil says. His voice sounds tight and shaky. “What is  _that_?”

He sees Roman’s jaw jump. The flicker of the Prince’s gaze betrays the uncertainty he won’t say.  _Roman doesn’t know_. Virgil’s breathing turns shallow. Roman had created this realm, hadn’t he? How could just  _not know_  what was in it?

There’s a beat of silence.

Then it lunges.

Virgil feels a weight slam into him, knocking him sideways. It— _whatever it is_ —shrieks, it’s wail amplifying and echoing against the rocks loud enough to hurt Virgil’s ears. A second later, as he scrambles to his feet, Virgil realizes that the shove have come from Roman. Pushing him out of the way.

It’s got Roman by the throat, shoved up against the door that wouldn’t open. The Prince—eyes wide, panicked—slashes at it with his sword. It hisses and drops him. Roman collapses to his knees.

Virgil’s throat constricts as everything around him heightens. His vision sharpens slightly. His heart is pounding in his chest, but no longer does it drown out the other sounds around him. He can hear Roman’s gasps for air. The quiet, inhuman clicks that seem to be coming from  _it_  as it rights itself. It doesn’t seem to be injured.

It glides frictionless towards Roman again. Virgil tries to shout his name, but it catches and mangles in his lungs. Virgil looks around for something to use. Anything.

 _There’s nothing_.

Roman’s surprised, terrified yell and the clatter of his sword as it is ripped from his grip grabs Virgil’s attention. The Creative Side flies through the air— _it isn’t even touching him, how the—_ before hitting the ground hard and rolling.

“ROMAN!” The strangled cry rips violently up his throat. A few feet to the left lies Roman’s sword.

It descends on the Prince like a shadow. Roman growls, pinned to the ground on his back by it. He attempts to fight it off—throwing punches, elbows, wrestling with it to gain the upper hand again—but whatever it might be is  _strong_  and Roman simply doesn’t stand a chance.

Raw instinct takes over. Virgil lunges for the sword.

Roman releases an anguished, pained scream as it rakes sharp talons across his chest.

“ _NO!”_  The distortion—so saturated in his voice that it doesn’t even sound like his anymore–amplifies the volume and reverberates against the stone. Virgil launches himself at it, fueled by the raw fight-or-flight adrenaline that floods his veins. He throws his full weight into it. His arms wraps around it and he tears it off of Roman. It shrieks.

Even up close, grappling with it in a flail of limbs, Virgil can’t quite tell what it is. It’s a corporeal shadow: not quite human, not quite  _anything_. Virgil tries, blindly and desperately, to slash at it with the sword. It wrenches his arm down, pinning it to the ground above his head as it scrambles to gain the upper hand.

Roman shouts something. Its snarl in Virgil’s ear keeps him from being able to make out what he says.

Its head—if it can even be called that—swivels over towards the Prince with renewed interest even as it struggles to pin Virgil to the ground just as it had with Roman.

“You want him?” Virgil grits out behind clenched teeth. “You’re gonna have to go through me.”

Roman yells something else, high and pained, but Virgil is too focused to pay attention to what it is.  _Protect him_. It’s all Virgil can think.

The Anxious Side pushes with everything he has left against its grip on his arm. He throws it off of him with a strangled, choked cry. It hisses, almost as if in surprise.

Virgil wrestles it to the ground, the sword still in his hands.

He shoves the blade into it.

It dissipates in a swirl of black smoke. The cavern echoes with an abrupt, startling silence. For a moment, the only thing Virgil can hear are his own wheezing gasps as he struggles to catch his breath. His hands are trembling. His eyes are locked on where it had been only seconds ago. The sword slips through his fingers and falls to the ground.

“V-Virgil?”

 _Roman_.

Virgil snaps out of it and frantically scrambles to his feet, rushing the few feet back to the Prince and nearly tripping over himself in the process. Roman’s usually pristine, white suit is dirtied and torn. The red sash is shredded, the same color as the blood stains across his chest that outline the tears in the fabric.

“Ro…” The name cuts off as his throat squeezes closed. Roman looks pale.

His eyes are dark and wide. For a brief moment, Virgil wants to describe it as awe. Or maybe it’s just fear. “You…” He coughs.

“Shut up,” Virgil says, harsher than he really means it to sound. His hands hover, unsure of where to touch or what to do. “You’re bleeding.” His voice sounds higher pitched than normal. “This is bad. This is bad. This is  _bad_.” His breath hitches. He can’t  _breathe_. He tries, and it rattles in his lungs.

“Virgil,” Roman says. He grimaces as he attempts to sit up, propping himself up with one arm. “I’ll be okay.”

“ _Roman_.” The distortion is back in his voice. “ _Don’t_. _Don’t lie to me._ ”

The Prince swallows, but his soft gaze doesn’t leave Virgil’s. “Truly. I just have to get back to my room. I have some things there that can help.” Virgil can tell from the way he breathes that he’s attempting to stifle the gasps of pain.

Virgil squeezes his eyes shut for a moment as his thoughts race a mile a minute. It took them five days to get here. That was five days back, maybe three if they could push it but with the state that Roman was in… and even then, Virgil doubts that Roman has that long. Could Roman… die? Become nothing? What would that do to Thomas? To Patton, to Logan?

It would be his fault. All his fault. He should have kept Roman from going on this quest in the first place. Why would Roman construct something in the mindscape that could  _kill him_? Why would he do that?

“Virge, open your eyes.”

“How do you expect us to get back to your room before—“

“Please.”

Frustrated— _terrified_ —Virgil reluctantly opens his eyes. The rock floor beneath his knees has been replaced by hardwood. Roman’s large canopy bed sits with the headboard against one wall. The French doors on another wall are open and a soft breeze dances in the thin white curtains. They’re back in Roman’s bedroom.

“I—what?” Virgil says, even as the distortion fades from his voice. His light brown eyes flicker around the room before falling back on Roman, still in his half-sitting position on the floor beside him.

“I sunk us out,” Roman says. His voice is still tight with pain. He grimaces again. “Virgil, if could go to my bookshelf, there’s a purple bottle…”

The Anxious Side jumps to his feet and hurries to the tall fixture in the corner of the room. He finds it almost immediately—it’s a small vial, a cork stopper shoved into the top of it—and snatches it off the shelf. Accidentally, he knocks a different bottle and sends it crashing into the hardwood. Virgil jumps at the sound, a gray liquid pooling at his feet.

Before he can say anything, Logan and Patton both appear in the room. “You’re back!” Patton says excitedly.

Virgil whirls around to face him. “I—“

“Roman!” Logan says in alarm, as he looks at the tattered state of the Prince’s suit, at the blood soaking the front of his chest. “What happened?”

“It’s a long story,” Virgil replies, rushing back to Roman with the vial in his hands. “So, uh, how does this work? Do you drink it?” Virgil pulls the stopper out. He realizes that the words are coming out all in a rush, but he doesn’t know how to slow down.

He doesn’t realize his hands are shaking until Roman covers them with his own. “It’s… topical. Just pour it over the injuries and let it do its thing.” He sounds  _unbelievably_ calm _._

Virgil laughs—wet and shaky and humorless—because Roman is the one that is injured so why can’t he just  _keep it together_. He swallows hard and nods. “Okay. Okay.” He drags in a tight, shallow breath, and then tips the vial over Roman’s chest, letting the dark violet liquid form a thin stream.

Virgil watches, a part of him amazed, as the liquid seems to disappear into Roman’s skin. The jagged, bloodied wounds across his chest glow faintly, the torn skin gradually fusing back together. The scratches disappear, with no sign they had ever been there save for slightly reddened skin.

When it has completed its job, Roman sags a little in relief and coughs.

“That’s… remarkable,” Logan breathes.

Roman throws the Logical Side an exhausted smile. “Concentrated Creativity. Potent stuff.” He coughs again. “Spending a significant amount of time here in my room would have the same effect, but this… speeds things along.”

“How do you feel, kiddo?” Patton asks, the worry ringing clear in his voice.

Roman lifts a shoulder. “Good as new, Padrè. Thanks to Virgil.”

Virgil is still staring at his chest. Had it really only been moments ago that he’d watched it slice through Roman’s skin and heard him scream? Before he can think, Virgil reaches a hand towards it, his fingertips lightly brushing the healed skin through the still-torn fabric. Roman goes very still.

Virgil’s breath catches faintly at feeling Roman real and solid and  _safe_. His skin is warm and soft beneath his fingers.

“Virge?” The Prince’s quiet voice catches his attention. Virgil glances up.

Roman’s still got a dark bruise on his cheekbone. His usually pristine hair is disheveled and streaked with dirt, sweat, some dried blood. Stale tear tracks mark their way through the grime on his face. There is something soft in his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” Roman whispers.

Virgil’s vision blurs and he averts his gaze even as Roman’s fingers close around his own lingering on the Prince’s chest.

“Guys, what  _happened_  to you?” Logan asks.

Virgil makes a noise in the back of his throat as he tries to open his mouth to answer. The memory is still too fresh. Too raw. He feels arms grab for him and suddenly he’s against something warm and familiar and he can tell by the way the fabric feels against his cheek that he’s in Roman’s arms.

He feels Roman lean in his head on the top of his own. “You…  _saved me_ , Virgil.”

Virgil releases a sound that is somewhere between a sob and a laugh of relief. “Fight or flight, remember?”

He can feel the Prince’s chest move as he sucks in a deep breath. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t… have done that to you. Your action should not have been necessary. I’m not… sure what happened, exactly, but I should have listened to you when you wanted to turn back.”

Patton’s voice softly speaks up. “What matters right now is that you are both safe. That’s enough, right?”

Virgil can still hear Roman’s anguished cry of pain reverberating in his head. He can’t help but feel that sound will haunt his nightmares for a while.

But as he listens to the thudding of Roman’s heart against his ear, the screams start to fade into the background. They give way to the steady, rhythmic reminder that Roman is, indeed, safe.

“Yeah,” Virgil agrees softly. “That’s enough.”

 


End file.
